Astroblog

Obscured by Clouds. The rough and ready blog of a cloud benighted biologist and amateur astronomer. Astroblog will cover my interests in astronomy, biology and Life, the Universe and Everything.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Southern Skywatch August 2009 edition is now up!

The eastern horizon on August 13 at 6:00 am AEST showing the Moon, the Pleiades, Venus and Mars all lined up.

The August edition of Southern Skywatch is now up. There is the occulation of Sigma Scorpii, the opposition of Jupiter, Mars and Venus in the morning sky and the return of of Mercury to the evening sky with close approaches to Regulus and Saturn. There is also the Persiid meteor shower.

Beware the Spinal Trap - Solidarity edition

Today, in Solidarity with Simon Singh, who is being sued by the British Chiropractic Association for the temerity of writing the truth, blogs an internet magazines world wide are reprinting his article that started the case (see below).

Some practitioners claim it is a cure-all but research suggests chiropractic therapy can be lethal

Simon SinghThe Guardian, Saturday April 19 2008

This is Chiropractic Awareness Week. So let's be aware. How about some awareness that may prevent harm and help you make truly informed choices? First, you might be surprised to know that the founder of chiropractic therapy, Daniel David Palmer, wrote that, "99% of all diseases are caused by displaced vertebrae". In the 1860s, Palmer began to develop his theory that the spine was involved in almost every illness because the spinal cord connects the brain to the rest of the body. Therefore any misalignment could cause a problem in distant parts of the body.

In fact, Palmer's first chiropractic intervention supposedly cured a man who had been profoundly deaf for 17 years. His second treatment was equally strange, because he claimed that he treated a patient with heart trouble by correcting a displaced vertebra.

You might think that modern chiropractors restrict themselves to treating back problems, but in fact they still possess some quite wacky ideas. The fundamentalists argue that they can cure anything. And even the more moderate chiropractors have ideas above their station. The British Chiropractic Association claims that their members can help treat children with colic, sleeping and feeding problems, frequent ear infections, asthma and prolonged crying, even though there is not a jot of evidence. This organisation is the respectable face of the chiropractic profession and yet it happily promotes [redacted word begining with b] treatments.

I can confidently label these treatments as bogus [changed to "utter nonsense" in the scrubbed version] because I have co-authored a book about alternative medicine with the world's first professor of complementary medicine, Edzard Ernst. He learned chiropractic techniques himself and used them as a doctor. This is when he began to see the need for some critical evaluation. Among other projects, he examined the evidence from 70 trials exploring the benefits of chiropractic therapy in conditions unrelated to the back. He found no evidence to suggest that chiropractors could treat any such conditions.

But what about chiropractic in the context of treating back problems? Manipulating the spine can cure some problems, but results are mixed. To be fair, conventional approaches, such as physiotherapy, also struggle to treat back problems with any consistency. Nevertheless, conventional therapy is still preferable because of the serious dangers associated with chiropractic.

In 2001, a systematic review of five studies revealed that roughly half of all chiropractic patients experience temporary adverse effects, such as pain, numbness, stiffness, dizziness and headaches. These are relatively minor effects, but the frequency is very high, and this has to be weighed against the limited benefit offered by chiropractors.

More worryingly, the hallmark technique of the chiropractor, known as high-velocity, low-amplitude thrust, carries much more significant risks. This involves pushing joints beyond their natural range of motion by applying a short, sharp force. Although this is a safe procedure for most patients, others can suffer dislocations and fractures.

Worse still, manipulation of the neck can damage the vertebral arteries, which supply blood to the brain. So-called vertebral dissection can ultimately cut off the blood supply, which in turn can lead to a stroke and even death. Because there is usually a delay between the vertebral dissection and the blockage of blood to the brain, the link between chiropractic and strokes went unnoticed for many years. Recently, however, it has been possible to identify cases where spinal manipulation has certainly been the cause of vertebral dissection.

Laurie Mathiason was a 20-year-old Canadian waitress who visited a chiropractor 21 times between 1997 and 1998 to relieve her low-back pain. On her penultimate visit she complained of stiffness in her neck. That evening she began dropping plates at the restaurant, so she returned to the chiropractor. As the chiropractor manipulated her neck, Mathiason began to cry, her eyes started to roll, she foamed at the mouth and her body began to convulse. She was rushed to hospital, slipped into a coma and died three days later. At the inquest, the coroner declared: "Laurie died of a ruptured vertebral artery, which occurred in association with a chiropractic manipulation of the neck."

This case is not unique. In Canada alone there have been several other women who have died after receiving chiropractic therapy, and Professor Ernst has identified about 700 cases of serious complications among the medical literature. This should be a major concern for health officials, particularly as under-reporting will mean that the actual number of cases is much higher.

Bearing all of this in mind, I will leave you with one message for Chiropractic Awareness Week - if spinal manipulation were a drug with such serious adverse effects and so little demonstrable benefit, then it would almost certainly have been taken off the market.

· Simon Singh is the co-author of Trick or Treatment? Alternative Medicine on Trial

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Occultation of Sigma Scorpii - July 31

The Moon and Scorpio in the western sky around 1:00 pm AEST Friday July 31 (click to embiggen).

The Moon passes in front of the bright star Sigma Scorpii in the head of the Scorpion on Friday July 31. While the keen eyed may see the star up to its disappearance, this event is best seen with binoculars or a telescope.

The unilluminated side of the Moon will pass in front of magnitude 2.3 Sigma Scorpii at various times depending on where you are:Adelaide 21:27 ACSTBrisbane 22:33 AESTCanberra 22:18 AESTDarwin no occultationHobart 22:15 AESTMelbourne 22:09 AESTPerth 18:58 AWSTSydney 22:23 AEST

The encounter is pretty much straight on, so the star should just wink out.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

The Sky This Week - Thursday July 30 to Thursday August 6

Evening sky looking west at 6:15 pm local time on August 3. Click to embiggen.

The Full Moon is Thursday August 6. The Moon passes in front of the bright star Sigma Scorpii around 10:15 pm (AEST) on Friday July 31.

Mercury is now visible in the evening twilight, low in the western sky. On Sunday and Monday (August 2 and 3), Mercury is very close to the bright star Regulus (see diagram left).

Saturn is visible in the early evening and can be easily seen as the second brightest object above the north-western horizon but now sets around 9:00 pm local time. Although Saturn is poorly placed for telescopic viewing, its rings are nearly edge on now.

Jupiter is easily seen as the brightest object above the eastern horizon from around 9 pm local time. Jupiter's Moons are readily visible in binoculars or a small telescope. The early morning of Thursday July 30 has a very interesting Moon alignment.

Mars, Venus, Aldebaran, Pleiades and Hyades at 6:00 am local time on Friday morning July 31, click to embiggen.

In the morning, Venus and Mars are readily visible in the eastern sky. Red Mars is below the A-shaped Hyades cluster, which forms the head of Taurus the Bull (see image above) . Bright white Venus is well below Aldebaran, and forms a triangle with Aldebaran and red Betelguese in Orion. On Thursday August 6 the Moon is near Jupiter.

Monday, July 27, 2009

Brook vs Pilmer in The great climate debate 2009

Barry Brook will be going head to head with Ian Plimer on the topic “Climate change is man made”.

The debate is at 6:30 pm on the 28th July at Engineering House, Bagot st, North Adelaide. Speakers have been told that they will be debating the topic: “Climate change is man made”. Speaker for the affirmative: Barry Brook. Speaker for the negative: Ian Plimer.

WHERE: 11 Bagot St, North Adelaide

$5 for members, $15 for non-members (funds raised contribute to Engineers Without Borders development projects)

It’s all about Science Envy

Fellows of the Discovery Institute seem to be over represented in fringe groups, Paul Nelson is a Young Earth Creationist, the Godfather of Intelligent Design Phillip Johnson and DI fellow Jonathan C. Wells have signed on to AIDS denial and Guillermo Gonzalez has signed on to a climate change denialist list.

Topically, given the debate about science communication that has been happening in the wake of of “Unscientific America”, in a recent article William Dembski dives into the whole Global Warming Denialism thing [1].

Ironically, at that same time in the 1970s, scientists were concerned not that the earth was warming but that it was cooling. The scare back then was global cooling!

Unfortunately for Dr. Dembski, this is a complete myth. There was no global cooling scare in the 70’s. While this is an indication of the level of fact checking involved in the article, more important is the subtext in this article, which makes more clear than ever the real concern of the Intelligent Design movement.

And this is the naked, unadulterated envy (and fear) of the power of scientists.

Holdren nevertheless represents the powerful new caste of scientists who have appointed themselves the guardians of humanity and the priests of a new social order. .... Their strategy is always the same: Scientists have discovered a problem that, as their models and data (often falsely) demonstrate, is on the verge of getting out of control; now, if only we do exactly as they say, we'll avoid catastrophe.

Stand in awe at the power of us scientists, we only have to use big words, show lots of data, click our fingers and politicians will um, er, well ..... ignore us actually (see also here). Until real disaster actually does strike.

Take air pollution: Scientists had been pointing out the issues with air pollution for years, but nothing really started getting underway until the killer smogs hit London. With acid rain, it was only after large swaths of forests began dying and lakes became sterile did anybody actually take action on scientists warnings. Collapsing fisheries? Scientists keep on warning about the consequences of overfishing but people tend to take notice only after a fishery has collapsed, and then don’t even put in decent fishing controls. Ozone hole? Despite well researched chemistry no one really listened until the ozone hole appeared over the Antarctic, then they scurried moved sluggishly, until finally we have bans on most ozone destroying CFC’s.

The true pattern is that scientists find an important issue, back it up with careful research, and have to fight persistently to get governments, businesses and the general public to take notice. Global warming is a case in point.

Now the scientific priesthood is telling us that the earth faces catastrophe if we don't mend our carbon-emitting ways and do everything we can to prevent global warming ("cap and trade" is only the beginning). .... In any case, the pattern is always the same: Find a problem, catastrophize it and make scientists the saviors.

According to George Marshal (New Scientist, 25 July 2009, page 24), it has taken 44 years of research that cost around $3 billion dollars per year, plus symposia conferences, journal articles, popular articles, documentaries and innumerable internet postings to ahh, convince politicians to come together and procrastinate. And still 40% of the UK population and over 50% of the US populations do not accept that human greenhouse gas emissions are changing the climate WWMAKD [2].

Even this weak, pathetic shadow of power that we do have provokes Dr. Dembski.

But isn't science our best, most reliable form of knowledge, and shouldn't we therefore defer to scientists?

Scientists are as fallible as the rest of us, as are their scientific theories. Indeed, the history of science is filled with failed scientific theories that once were confidently asserted and now have been radically modified or even abandoned

When John Snow closed down the Broad Street Pump the Germ theory of Disease was only just being devised. It would be significantly changed and revised multiple times before being properly formulated by Koch, and would keep on being revised multiple times since then (viruses and prions being new additions to the fold). Despite the deficiencies of the germ theory at the time, Snows actions lead to sewage and clean water works that would save millions from disease, Lister’s work would revolutionise surgery, and Koch would revolutionise medicine.

Should we have not put in sewerage works or ignored antiseptics until the germ theory of disease was in its modern form?

Science is not perfect by any means, but if you want practical solutions to practical problems it is the only way to go.

In claiming to find and then resolve problems that threaten to overwhelm humanity, they have invaded the political scene, commanding vast research moneys and attempting to force on the wider population government-sanctioned programs for social control.

Scientists, fear us, we will take your children and feed them the best available knowledge.

Of course science invades the political scene, if we want to reduce childhood deaths, prevent the spread of hepatitis C (let alone AIDS), respond to the spread of H1N1 (the flu formerly known as swine flu), slow the rise of antibacterial resistance by limiting antibiotic use in animal husbandry, make informed decisions on genetically modified foods, do anything which requires an evidence base, it will of course require science by its very nature (and involve politics because these things all involve governments at various levels).

An example is the response to HIV in Australia. The advent of HIV/AIDS in Australia resulted in an academic-grass roots collaboration which amongst other things brought about the execrable “Death goes bowling” ad (but this played a huge role in raising AIDS awareness), testing of blood donations to prevent HIV contamination of blood stocks, the “If it’s not on it’s not on” campaign, where giant condoms were plastered across buses and trams, needle exchange programs and safe needle disposal containers in public toilets.

This is exactly the sort of thing where science invades the political sphere, where we want it to invade the political sphere, and I have no doubt the Australian approach would have given Dr. Dembski a conniption fit. Certainly our approach was vigorously opposed by conservative politicians in the US. What are the results of this horrible, materialist, evidence based approach? Australia has a AIDS incidence of 0.9 per 100,000 population, over 10 times lower than that in the United States (12.8 per 100,000). And the last time I looked, Australia wasn’t markedly more decadent that the US. How dare we scientists save lives without corrupting youth!

Seriously, what does Dembski think we should do when forming policies, consult sheep entrails? The whole article reeks of fear and envy of scientists.

And the "vast research moneys"? The US military budget for 2006 was $527 billion, the NIH was around $30 billion and the National Science Foundation was around $6 billion in 2006, of which only $4 billion goes for research (2006 data as it was the only comparable data I could find at short notice). That may sound a lot, but the US had roughly 1.2 million researchers in 2006, so that money has to be spread over a lot of programs, from computing to polar science. The average NSF grant size is $140,000 which covers research costs, salaries, on costs etc.

We pay our soccer players more. Heck, to put this in perspective, Melbourne just spent $240,000 on a new logo. Vast research moneys? Ha!

Now some large collaborative projects will be funded to well over a million dollars (Large Hadron Collider or Human Genome project anyone?). But again, in terms of global warming, this goes for things like researchers salaries to actually do work, satellite data costs, sending out boats and so on to collect data, sample collection, preparation and analysis and computer time for data reduction. While this may be more money than Dembski will ever see as a philosopher, this is because scientists actually do stuff. Somebody actually has to go and drill ice cores then count the ice layers and extract gases and measure their CO2 content.

Insofar as they are trying to influence the public square, they need to explain themselves in plain English and they need to allow fair discussion and open dissent. Plenty of qualified scientists dispute that humans are significantly contributing to global warming or that extreme counter-measures are necessary. But the scientific priesthood quashes all such dissent, marginalizing and even persecuting those who don’t toe the party line.

Ohhh, Scientists use big words! Scary! Dembski also trots out the “lots of scientists dissent” myth and the “big science quashes debate” myth. Bjørn Lomborg has such a hard time getting heard, I should be so persecuted. Here in Australia, any Global Warming Denier gets a free ride in the national newspaper The Australian, no matter how loony, but real climate scientists are ignored. How’s that for power?

In reality, scientists would be chuffed if we had a thousandth of the power that Dembski ascribes to us. Any gains we make in any area of public policy, from global warming, to safe limits for pollutants, to effective public health practices, is a hard slog which first involves lots of hard data, and then convincing people at various levels in Government and Industry that things are serious. Long hard slogs, always starting with the evidence. And, in most cases, both government and Industry and other stakeholders are sympathetic.

Scientists are not our masters. They are our servants, and they need a lesson in humility. It is up to us -- We the People -- to hold their feet to the fire.

[2] WWMAKD What would Mooney and Kirshenbaum do. Chris and Sheril claim we scientists need to get out and communicate more. However, despite innumerable public talks, freely available websites, IPCC downloadable reports, debates, documentaries, newspaper and magazine articles it's hard to see what scientists could do to make the science of climate change simpler and easier to understand. For example, tomorrow Professor Barry Brook, the Director of Climate Science at The Environment Institute, University of Adelaide, will debate Climate Change Denier Ian Pilmer. Barry has has published two books and regularly writes opinion pieces and popular articles for the media as well as talking to a variety of community groups (I've heard him talk, he's great!). Yet ignorance on the topic abounds. What more can he do? Suggestions Chris and Sheril please.

Aquariid Meteor shower 28-29 July 2009

Eastern horizon around 11 pm local time July 28. The red circle shows the location of the apparent origin of the Aquariid meteors (the radiant). Click to embiggen.

Just a reminder that on Tuesday July 28- Wednesday 29 the Aquariid meteor shower peaks. You can see meteors before or after thios time but the numbers will be less (see the meteor flux estimator below).

At the peak, people in the suburbs should see a meteor around once every 6 minutes, and in the country about once every 3 minutes, from between 1 am to 3 am on July 29. The apparent origin of the meteors is about two handspans east of Jupiter, so if you look in the direction of Jupiter (the brightest object in the sky at that time) you should have a good view. Use the NASA meteor shower flux estimator to see what the shower will be like from your location. You need to choose 5 South. Delta Aquariids and remember to set the date to 28-29 July 2009.

Red Eyes for the Bull

Mars (centre left) makes a second eye for Taurus the Bull, along with red Aldebaran. Below, Venus is near the tip of one of the horns of the Bull. Elnath, the tip of the other horn, is behind the trees. Click to embiggen and see the Pleiades and Hyades.

Sunday, July 26, 2009

A Clouded Moon (Part 2)

Another magnificent Lunar image from Tony Travaglia of Otago, New Zealand. This image shows the Moon shining through clouds (clcik to embiggen). It has been lightly photoshopped. The deatil in the Moon is fantastic, I wish I could take pictures like this.

Carnival of Space #113 is here.

Carnival of Space #113 is now up at Dynamics of Cats. The special theme of this edition is impacts. Not surprisingly the recent impact of Wesley's Object on Jupiter is discussed. There is also returning samples from the Moon, things we have thrown at the Moon, the importance of amateur astronomers and lots lots more. Grab your sample tongs and head on over.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

The Sun is Dogged

Reader Graham Barnett sends in this marvellous image of a parhelion, or Sun Dog. This was seen at Parkdale Victoria about 4:10 PM 19-07-09 for quite a while. The images were taken by his son-in-law with his digital camera (click to embiggen).

Sund Dogs tend to be rather rare in Australia, and are formed in a manner similar to rainbows, but represent the suns light being reflected back by thin plate like-ice crystals high in the atmosphere.

Friday, July 24, 2009

Seeing the Emu

The eastern horizon, around 9:00 pm local time in Australia. Can you see the Emu? Click to embiggen.

This is the third of a planned series of posts on looking at the sky and how to find your way around it as a beginner.

Now, when the Moon is still in its very early crescent stages, is a great time to find the constellation of the Emu. Now you are saying: ‘Emu – but there is no Emu!’ However, the Emu is one of the indigenous Australian constellations. And interestingly, it is a "dark" constellation, one that is made up entirely of dark dust lanes!

"Dark" constellations are unique to the Southern hemisphere. In South America they had the constellations of the Tinamou (and Emu relative) and two llamas making up the constellation the Indigenous Australians called the Emu*.

See the Emu now?

The Emu consists of the Coal Sack, the dark dust cloud that nestles in the crook of the Southern Cross (the head of the Emu), and a dark dust lane that stars near the Pointers (alpha and beta Centauri) and runs down to the curl of stars that forms the body of Scorpio. This is the neck and wings of the Emu. A second dark dust lane forms the lower body and legs.

Being made of dark dust lanes, it is almost impossible to see in any city. However, here in the suburbs, if I let my eyes adapt for several minutes I can make it out. And of course in the country it is almost immediately obvious. Once you spot it, you will wonder why you never saw the Emu before. The best time too look currently is about an hour and a half after sunset, when the Emu is nearly vertical and easier to recognise. Later, it stretches over the Southern sky more or less side on, so it is less impressive.

*There is more than one Emu, another Indigenous group identifies Orion as an Emu.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

The Sky This Week - Thursday July 23 to Thursday July 30

Mars, Venus, Aldebaran, Pleiades and Hyades at 6:00 am local time on Friday morning July 24, click to embiggen.

The First Quarter Moon is Wednesday July 29.

Saturn is visible in the early evening and can be easily seen as the second brightest object above the north-western horizon but now sets around 9:00 pm local time.

Jupiter is easily seen as the brightest object above the eastern horizon from around 10 pm local time. Jupiter's Moons are readilyvisible in binoculars or a small telescope.

In the morning, Venus and Mars are readily visible in the eastern sky. Red Mars is not far fromthe beautiful Pleaides cluster, near the A-shaped Hyades cluster, which forms the head of Taurus the Bull. Between Thursday July 23 and Sunday July 26 Mars is close to bright red Aldebaran in the Hyades, forming a second red "eye" for the Bull (see image above) . Bright white Venus is well below Aldebaran, and is close to the star that forms the tip of theBulls right horn. The combination of Mars and Venus makes the constellation more Bull -like, although Venus does not properly get into position until Tuesday July 28.

Eastern horizon around 11 pm local time July 28. The red circle shows the location of the apparent origin of the Aquariid meteors (the radiant). Click to embiggen.

On Tuesday July 28- Wednesday 29 the Aquariid meteor shower peaks. People in the suburbs should see a meteor around once every 6 minutes, and in the country about once every 3 minutes, from between 1 am to 3 am on July 29. The apparent origin of the meteors is about two handspans east of Jupiter, so if you look in the direction of Jupiter (the brightest object in the sky at that time) you should have a good view. Use the NASA meteor shower flux estimator to see what the shower will be like from your location. You need to choose 5 South. Delta Aquariids and remember to set the date to 28-29 July 2009.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Carnival of Space #112 is here.

Carnival of Space #112 is now up at Out of the Cradle. Being released on the anniversary of the Moon Landing, there is a certain theme to this Carnival "The Big Moon Day Show". Get your Lunar Rovers and bump on over for a read of Moon-related goodness.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Where were You When People First Walked on the Moon?

Shortly before 12:56pm AEST on July 21, 1969 we were gathered into a classroom at my high school to watch Neil Armstrong become the first human to walk on the Moon.

Which classroom? Who was there with me? I don't remember (I do have a vague impression it was the Great Hall, and there were lots of us there), I was completely focussed on the grainy black and white images beamed back from the Moon.

If you have memories of the Lunar landing you can share them at the Australian ABC website "Footprints on the Moon" (and watch the video there).

Internationally, Echos of Apollo also celebrates todays 40th anniversary with time lines, stories, podcasts and videos. Over on The Pandas Thumb Richard B. Hoppe shares his memories of being involved with the engineering of the Apollo 11 module.

Friday, July 17, 2009

Let the Moon Be Your Guide!

Left: The Moon near Jupiter on Saturday night July 11 10:00 pm local time. Right: Moon near Mars, Venus, Aldebaran, Pleiades and Hyades a 6:00 am local time on Sunday Morning July 19.

This is the second of a planned series of posts on looking at the sky and how to find your way around it as a beginner.

Finding things in the sky can be confusing, sure you can get downloadable star maps, but trying to match up a host of bright points with the dots on the map can be a herculean task sometimes. Sometimes you need a signpost, something bright and obvious you can't mistake for anything else.

Like the Moon.

The Moon has the advantage of passing quite close to several interesting bright stras and all the planets, so if you know when the moon and a planet are close, you can readily pick the planet out, and memorise its location for future reference on another night the Moon isn't conveniently close. See the two examples above for locating bright planets near the Moon.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

The Sky This Week - Thursday July 16 to Thursday July 23

Moon near Mars, Venus, Aldebaran, Pleiades and Hyades at 6:00 am local time on Sunday morning July 19, click to embiggen.

The New Moon is Wednesday July 22.

The 40th Anniversary of the first moon landing is on Tuesday July 21 (Australian time), but the Moon will be a near invisible crescent.

Saturn is visible in the early evening and can be easily seen as the second brightest object abovethe north-western horizon. It is about a quarter of the way between the bright stars Regulus and Spica.

Jupiter is easily seen as the brightest object above the eastern horizon from around 10 pm local time. Jupiter's Moons are readily visible in binoculars or a small telescope.

In the morning, Venus and Mars are readily visible in the eastern sky. Red Mars is between the beautiful Pleaides cluster, and the A-shaped Hyades cluster, while bright white Venus is below bright red Aldebaran. On the morning of Saturday July 18The crescent Moon, Mars, Aldebaran and Venus form a narrow triangle, while on the 19th these bright objects form a close square (see above image), making for marvellous morning viewing.

On Thursday July 23 Mars is close to Aldebaran in the Hyades, forming a second red "eye" in the head of Taurus the Bull.

"Unscientific America" and the case of Pluto

There has been a lot of web discussion about Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum's new book, “Unscientific America” (particularly over PZ Myers review, see their response to PZ Myers here). I’d like to focus on one part from the beginning of the book, the one that got PZ exercised, that I think illustrates an important problem with the book. You can read the excerpt from the book that deals with the issue of the demotion of Pluto here.

[numerous t-shirt slogans omitted]So read a small sampling of the defiant T-shirt and bumper sticker slogans that emerged in late 2006 after the International Astronomical Union (IAU), meeting in Prague, opted to poke the public with a sharp stick. The union's general assembly voted to excommunicate the ninth planet from the solar system, thus abruptly stripping Pluto of a status as much cultural, historic, and even mythological as scientific.

Here the IAU, as representative scientists, is shown as being antagonistic to the public. But why? Why is the Pluto decision “poking the public with a sharp stick? The IAU was making a ruling based on our scientific understanding to resolve a long standing problem. This ruling did not come out of nowhere and the lead-up was well publicised.

In the astronomers' defense, it had become increasingly difficult to justify calling Pluto a planet without doing the same for several other more recently discovered heavenly objects--one of which, the distant freezing rock now known as Eris (formerly "Xena"), turns out to be larger. But that didn't mean the experts had to fire Pluto from its previous place in the firmament. In defining the word "planet," they were arguably not so much engaged in science as a semantic exercise …....

Keeping Pluto a planet was a lot more than semantics. Up until the notorious 2006 decision, there was no accepted definition of a planet. Also, by the 1990’s it was increasingly evident that Pluto was not like the other planets. It’s orbit was unusual, very much tilted to the plane of the other planets, and much more elliptical, even coming inside the orbit of Neptune at its closest approach to the Sun. Pluto was also very small, while it was originally thought to be 90% the size of Earth, subsequent study showed it was 2/3rds the size of Earth’s Moon. In the meantime, the Kuiper Belt objects had been discovered. Small icy objects with orbits similar to Pluto’s in inclination and distance. As time went on, larger and larger Kuiper Belt objects were discovered, approaching that of Pluto in size (eg Sedna). The Kuiper Belt object composition was also similar to that of Pluto.

It was increasingly obvious that Pluto was just a large Kuiper belt object and that sooner or later other icy worlds, the same size as Pluto or bigger, would turn up. As well, while the classical planets were thought to be formed from accretion of smaller objects, the Kuiper belt objects (including Pluto) were thought to be leftovers from the formation of the solar system. So Pluto had a different history to the classical planets. Spurred by this knowledge, from 1998 there were various attempts to create a definition of a planet that would deal with Pluto and the new Kuiper Belt bodies. Attempts to find a definition that would have a sensible physical definition and keep Pluto as a planet all failed.

The issue was finally forced by the discovery of UB313 (Eris). It was (just) larger than Pluto, was it a planet? The IAU finally had to come up with a definition of a planet. After a number of attempts, a panel of notable scientists and writer Dava Sobel (Longitude, The Planets) provided a definition that was based on physical properties, and tried to avoid any arbitrariness. They proposed that a planet was anything that was large enough that gravity pulled it into a sphere. They then divided the Planets into Classical Planets (Mercury to Neptune) and Dwarf Planets (things like Pluto, Ceres and Eris) based on whether the planet was gravitationally dominant (ie was it big enough to sweep away all the floating junk in the planets local area, dwarf planets didn't).

Again, as you will note, the issue wasn’t one of semantics, but finding a set of physical properties of the objects that could separate planets from non-planets without an arbitrary dividing line. If Pluto was to be called a planet, then what definition would exclude the dozens of icy lumps in similar orbits that were a tad smaller? If you didn’t exclude them, then up to 20-40 planets would have been created. The public may have been ready for a 10th planet, but over 20? More than semantics were at stake here.

In the end, after a fair bit of argy-bargy, the definition of “Planet” adopted was one where an object was big enough to be spherical and have enough gravitational grunt to sweep up all the debris near it. Things that were merely spherical became dwarf planets. Pluto got demoted.

Why suddenly kick Pluto out of the planet fraternity after letting it stay in for nearly a century, ever since its 1930 discovery? "No do-overs," wrote one cartoonist..... how could this planetary crackup happen in the first place? Didn't the scientists involved foresee such an outcry from the public? Did they simply not care? Was the Pluto decision really scientifically necessary?

There was nothing sudden about it. Back in 1995 astronomer Dave Jewitt received death treats for suggesting that Pluto was just a Kuiper belt object. In 1998 the first serious attempts to define a planet went rumbling through the professional and amateur astronomical worlds, and listservs buzzed with debate. In 2001 Neil deGrasse Tyson cheekily put up an exhibit at the Hayden planetarium suggesting that Pluto should not be a planet. This was widely reported in tradition and electronic media. The issue arose again in 2004 with the discovery of Sedna, and yet again when Eris, larger than Pluto was discovered.

Previous attempts to define a planet that kept Pluto as a planet had failed, but now a ruling was absolutely required, otherwise Eris (and any other large transneptunian object subsequently discovered) would be in limbo. From the discovery of Eris to the fateful meeting in 2006 there was a well publicised debate.

It's not like this was not without precedent, for 40 years from around 1806 the solar system had 11 planets, Mercury to Uranus and Ceres, Pallas, Vesta and Juno (by 1845 there were 17). They were listed in professional and popular works on the planets and astronomy. More and more of the lumps of rocky rubble turned up, until there were nearly 100 of them. Then in 1846, in a parallel to the recent events, Neptune was discovered; Ceres, Pllas, Vesta and Juno were demoted to "minor planets" and everyone moved on.

The furor over Pluto is just one particularly colorful example of the rift that exists today between the world of science and the rest of our society.

How? What is this meant to show? That scientists are mean? That seems to be one theme ("The International Astronomical Union (IAU)... opted to poke the public with a sharp stick", "Didn't the scientists involved foresee such an outcry from the public? Did they simply not care?"). Astronomers did forsee an outcry from the public, and they did care (especially as several of their own number had a strong attachment to Pluto s a planet). But they needed to make a decision, they had an object larger than Pluto, and they needed a definition of a planet to decide on its status, or Eris would have remained in scientific limbo. The Pluto decision was scientifically necessary.

Does it show that scientists are poor communicators? From 2001 on the debate over Pluto's status was accompanied by high visibility events such as Neil deGrasse Tyson's planetarium exhibit, which was well covered in the media. Listen to his story of receiving hate mail from 3rd graders here. The discovery of Sedna and then Eris were high profile events in which the question of Pluto's planet hood was raised with discussion of why a planetary determination was necessary. The lead up to the IAU meeting was covered in the traditional and electronic media. For example, Mike Brown the leader of the team that discovered Eris kept a rapidly updated web page and wrote popular articles for outlets such as the New York Times. The IAU issued press releases, had a large media presence and had a special presentation by Joycelyn Bell Burnell (the discover of Pulsars) to explain the significance and reasoning behind the decision that was made. What more could they do?

Is the point that the American public are woefully ignorant of science? We should be happy that they knew what Pluto was. From 1995 to 2009 nearly 50% of Americans did not know that Earth took a year to orbit the Sun, one in 5 Americans did not know that Earth orbits the Sun (don't get cocky non-Americans, the figures are similar for Europe and Australia and Yes, I know I got the curve for that wrong in the diagram, I'll fix that later fixed).

So what, exactly, is Moony and Kirshenbaum's point? That scientists shouldn't have chosen a definition that excluded Pluto? They needed a rational, non-arbitrary demarcation, we had a choice between 8 planets and a bunch of smaller stuff, or something like 20+ planets based on rational definitions. I'm not sure that the public would be pleased with having to learn Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Ceres, Vesta, Pallas, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Charon, Orcus, Ixus, Quoarar, Sendna, Eris .... and so on as the solar systems planetary lineup. Either way, a non-arbitrary decision had to be made.

Was their point that scientists didn't try hard enough to get their points across? It's hard to see what more they could have done, they pursued all available avenues of public communication and this was riding on the coat-tails of very exciting discoveries that the public were interested in and had significant exposure in traditional media. How more high profile could they get?

To put this in perspective, NASA has an enormous outreach program, high profile impact because of the stunning nature of the subjects it covers (and people really like space exploration), flashy websites, stunning images, education sites and helpful animations. And STILL one in five Americans don't realise that Earth rotates around the Sun and around 50% don't realise that Earth takes a year to rotate around the Sun. If those simple facts can't be gotten across with a huge expenditure of money, how are ordinary astronomers with modest budgets going to get their ideas about Pluto across.

The most disturbing thing is that Mooney and Kirshenbaum should have known the history of the Pluto debate, the details are easily available and there are two substantial books about this. Mooney and Kirshenbaum's statements about the issues are almost completely wrong. If they can't something as simple as this right, what about the other issues in this book?

UPDATE: You can read the IAU's own document on communicating science at the 2006 "Pluto" meeting here (Warning 25 Mb document). The IAU put a lot of thought and resources (press releases, arranging journalist interviews, web links, web-based video and interviews etc.) into communicating science and the Pluto issue at this meeting. Not everything worked, but we can safely say that the public reaction occurred despite a large amount of outreach and communication on the part of the IAU and other astronomers.

Like all my Pluto Posts, this one should be read listening to Jimmy and the Keys "They Demoted Pluto".

And really, really listen to Neil deGrasse Tyson's talk on Pluto's demotion (It's really quite informative and amusing, according to him, Europeans did not have the same visceral reaction).

Two Eyes for the Bull

Venus forms a second eye in the head of Taurus the Bull. You really will have to click to embiggen to see the Hyades and the Pleiades. Mars is top left Aldebaran is middle right, Venus is obvious.

Typically, the sky was covered in cloud when I got up, but it managed to clear just in time for me to get this shot and appreciate the scenes beauty. Venus moves on a bit further tomorrow, but the effect should be somewhat sim ilar.

Sunday, July 12, 2009

Semi-Liveblogging the Festival of Ideas

10:15 am: I'm currently having coffee in the booksellers tent at the entrance to Elder hall, while waiting for Simon Singh's talk to begin. As typical, there are lots of things I want to see that are all on at the same time. Climate change and Drug Prohibition for instance (hey, I'm a Pharmacologist), then Life: It's Origin and Evolution is on at the same time as New Directions in Astronomy and Darwin's Armada (sobs).

1:15 pm: I suck at this. But I got to talk personally to Antonio Lazcano and Alex Wodak, that was brilliant. If you want to listen to these talks Radio Adelaide will be streaming audio from the sessions, and podcasts will be eventually available here.

First off, my (very brief) talk with Antionio Lacanzo. I was waiting to get into the session on drug prohibition with Alex Wodak (see this youtube Video) when I notice that the tall (at least to me) figure standing next to me was awfully familiar form varuious book covers, I introduced myself and established that he was indeed Antonio, and then I went all fanboy. Look, this man is one of the top origin of life researchers in the world, and I've been following his work for years. He said that Australia was one of the leading places for Astrobiology, and we had an advantage that the US didn't, our secular society and low level of creationism. I had to point out that we export our creationists to the US.

Yikes, it's almost time to go into the session on Origin of life, I have no idea how PZ Myers can liveblog conferences. Gotta rush.

2:52 pm: Antonio Lacanzo's session was brilliant. Did you know the first letters in ribose stand for Rockerfeller Institute of Biology? I didn't. Seesh, by the time the computer boots up it's time for the next session, "Beyond Evolution". I'll have to wait until I get home to write propper descriptions of these talks.

Adelaide Festival of Ideas today (Sunday July 12)

The Adelaide Festival of Ideas is free, and has world famous science communicator Simon Singh speaking on sense and nonsense, world renowned origin of life researcher Antonio Lazcano speaking on the origin of life, and the two of them team up to discuss "Beyond Evolution".

Friday, July 10, 2009

A Record Breaking Image of the Moon

Run, don't walk to the Lunar World Record 2009 page. It's the "...world's largest ground-based lunar image mosaic. It contains 288 separate high resolution panes, painstakingly stitched and matched together to form a seamless image." It's zoomable too. Fantastic! Hat tip to Starts with a Bang.

Thursday, July 09, 2009

The Sky This Week - Thursday July 9 to Thursday July 16

The Eastern Horizon as seen from Australia at 6:00 am local time, click to embiggen.

The Last Quarter Moon is Wednesday July 15.

Saturn is visible in the early evening and can be easily seen as the second brightest object above the north-western horizon. It is about a quarter of the way between the bright stars Regulus and Spica.

On Friday July 10 the waning Moon is not far from Jupiter. Jupiter can be seen just above the eastern horizon before 10 pm local time but it is still best seen in the morning with the other bright planets, Venus and Mars.

Mars is just above the beautiful Pleaides cluster, and Venus is close to the A-shaped Hyades cluster (see chart above), on the morning of Monday July 13 Venus is close to bright red Aldebaran in the Hyades, forming a second "eye" in the head of Taurus the Bull.

If you are an early morning riser with a small telescope, Jupiter's Moons are readily visible (also in binoculars) and Venus is in 'waxing Moon" Phase.

Mars, Venus and Aldebaran line up

A beautiful sight this morning. Mars (far left) Venus and the red star Aldebaran (lower right) all in a line. Mars is above the Pleiades cluster as well, making a very pleasant scene. (Click on image to embiggen)

Keep watching as Venus and Aldebaran draw closer over the next few days

Tuesday, July 07, 2009

Penumbral Lunar Eclipse July 7, 2009

Tonight sees a very weak penumbral eclipse, where the Moon will just brush the outer edges of the outer shadow of the Earth. Maximum eclipse is 7:30 pm AEDST, 7:00 pm ACDST and 5:30 pm AWST. The northern edge of the Moon will undergo a faint darkening, so faint that only the people with the best visual acuity will see it (and in WA the eclise is in twilight, so it will be impossible to see there).

Update: Meh! didn't notice that I worte AEDST, that was meant to be AEST. Still, the Moon looked marvellous rising through thin cloud, but there was no way I could see any prenumbral darkening through the cloud.

Unexpected Rainbows (Part 5)

Monday, July 06, 2009

Dark Rings of Saturn

The Sun is getting close to passing through Saturn's ring plane. As a result the rings are becoming dark. Here is an image of the "dark rings" taken by Anthony Wesley of Canberra. A full Saturn Gallery is here.

Friday, July 03, 2009

The Sky This Week - Thursday July 2 to Thursday July 9

Current Phase of the Moon:your browser does not support IFRAMEs The Eastern Horizon as seen from Australia at 6:00 am local time, click to embiggen.

The Full Moon is Tuesday July 7. On Saturday July 4 the Moon is very close to the bright red star Antares.

Saturn is visible in the early evening and can be easily seen as the second brightest object above the north-eastern horizon. It is about a quarter of the way between the bright stars Regulus and Spica.

Jupiter can be seen just above the eastern horizon before 10 pm local time but it is still best seen in the morning with the other bright planets, Venus and Mars.

Mars and Venus are close together, and in a very beautiful region of the Morning sky, Near the Pleaides, Hyades and the Constellation Orion (see Chart). Mars and Venus continue to draw apart during the week. Mercury is now lost to view, and will reappear in the evening later this month.

If you are an early morning riser with a small telescope, Jupiter's Moons are readily visible (also in binoculars) and Venus is in 'waxing Moon" Phase.

Cosmic Diary - Black Holes

Few scientific topics capture people's imaginations as well as black holes. The mere mention is often enough to interest and captivate an audience. But how much do scientists actually know about these astronomical anomalies? How are they related to quasars, x-rays, and galaxies? And of course, if they swallow light, how can we see them? This article will help put many pieces of the puzzle together, resulting in a clear image explaining all about the nature of black holes.

Thursday, July 02, 2009

Ring around the Moon

Even cloudy night can bring beautiful sights, as I have mentioned before. In this case high, thin clouds have made a coloured ring around the Moon, a kind of Moonbow. It looked more dramatic to the unaided eye, as the long exposure to pick up the colour overexposes the Moon.

Wednesday, July 01, 2009

Carnival of Space #109 is here.

Carnival of Space #109 is now up at Twisted Physics. There's the tragedy of Fred Hoyle, looking for bacl Holes, documenting Apollo 11, really big telescopes, salt (or maybe not) at Saturn and lots, lots, more. Spin on over and have a look.